They slipped off their shoes too and padded in behind her. Mark couldn’t hold back a smile at the elegance of the room she led them into. Sandra caught the appreciative glance, and addressed herself to him. ‘So what did bring you here?’
‘Edwina’s attempted murder, for a start,’ he said. ‘Because I live in a hamlet, I can understand that you’re all closing ranks to protect a woman who had to protect her child and escape an unhappy marriage, even if she took with her a rather greater share of their joint finances than she was legally entitled to. That’s fine. But as we said last night, endangering other people’s lives is not fine. But we can’t tell our masters to pull us out of the enquiry because they’re not our masters any longer.’
‘You’ve given up the case? Excellent. I think that calls for a glass of sherry, don’t you?’
‘It might be a bit early in the day for us, thank you,’ Mark said. ‘We still have a lot of work to do.’
‘But you said—’
‘We’re working for a different team now. As from this morning. We’re investigating police corruption. A civilized country stands or falls on the incorruptibility of its police. If you know anything, we beg you to help us.’
Silently Fran was humming ‘Nimrod’ but her face assumed the earnest expression Mark’s appeal deserved.
‘You’re so right. I just wish I could. At least let me offer you coffee or tea. I have some excellent gunpowder.’
Mark was ready to accept when his phone rang. ‘It’s Edwina,’ he told his hostess. ‘Can you excuse me while I take it?’ He stepped into the hall. Within two minutes he returned. ‘I’m afraid we shall have to decline your kind invitation. Your friend needs us urgently.’
Under her make-up Sandra paled. ‘Is she ill? Shall I call the ambulance? Or the police?’
Mark laid a reassuring hand on her arm, and channelled Dixon of Dock Green: ‘Just leave it to us, Mrs Mould. But bear in mind what we said earlier. This is my mobile number, in case you want to contact me.’
‘It was my day for cleaning under beds,’ Edwina declared, looking like Boudicca on the warpath. ‘And having found one, I found another under the sofa and a third under the dining table. They’re in the compost heap now. I didn’t think you’d want them to overhear our current conversation.’ She sat down suddenly. ‘In my house, darlings. Bugs! Whenever could they have got here?’ She sounded as disgusted as if she’d been invaded by cockroaches, not listening devices.
‘When our water-loving friend hit you and used your key to get in.’
‘Oh, and I never paid you for the new locks! Oh, Fran.’
‘And I never paid compensation for your whack on the head. So let’s call it quits.’
Edwina looked at her with narrowed eyes. ‘Are these people paying your expenses? Well then, put it on their bill.’
‘Email from Tony Woolmer?’ Mark queried, passing Fran the iPad. They were in the kitchen, which appeared to be bug-free, making Edwina a cup of tea, on the grounds that though she, like Sandra, favoured a glass of sherry (in her case restorative), tea would do them all so much more good.
‘Suffolk Police. It’ll be about Anna Fratello.’
It was. Anna had returned and promptly departed again, this time by car overnight. Suffolk Police had her registration number and were circulating it to all forces. Fran chewed her lip. That made her sound like a criminal; should she ask Tony to cancel the alert?
Someone else it might be fruitful to speak to further was Desmond Markwell, that weird private detective. Dean Redhead had said his presence was the most troublesome part of the case; should she pay him another visit? Just call him, maybe? But first, retiring to the Audi, just in case they’d missed any bugs, she called Fi Biddlestone. Not to ask permission to respond to Markwell’s blackmail. Just to talk, one ex-cop to another. She should have done it earlier, out of courtesy, shouldn’t she? Like a lot of other things. But as Macmillan might or might not have said, Events, dear boy, events. And they’d experienced a lot of events.
Fortunately for Fi Biddlestone, one of her neighbours drove a tractor, and he kept her in supplies. Boredom or loneliness, however, prompted outpourings of nothingness far longer than Fran felt she had time for. On the other hand, she owed Fi at least one favour, and she didn’t bring the one-sided conversation round to the topic she really needed to raise. At last, however, Fi came round to it herself. ‘Did you ever get to see Desmond … Desmond Markwell?’
‘I did indeed. He asked after you.’
The tiny gasp was audible. ‘Did he? How was he?’
According to Mark, Downs had described her as a silly bitch; Fran thought she sounded more like a lovelorn girl – not good at sixty. But then, hadn’t she felt the same at the start of her relationship with Mark? ‘Enigmatic, I’d say, Fi. Not very helpful. Sorry.’
‘Would it help if I spoke to him?’
Fran was sure that Fi would hear her deep breath. ‘It might help our enquiry. But if it wouldn’t help you …’ She waited a long time before adding, ‘He did ask for your phone number.’
‘He’s a detective, for goodness’ sake! Couldn’t he just have looked me up? Oh, there’s his wife, of course. But he still wanted it?’
‘Mischievously, I’d say. As a bargaining tool. But I didn’t want to betray your confidence without asking you first.’
‘Bargaining tool as in he wouldn’t give you information till you’d given him my number.’ Fi seemed to be mulling it over. Did she see the blackmail as the sign of a desperate man or the mark of a total bastard? To be honest, even Fran would have been hard put to make the call. ‘OK,’ Fi said, surprising her, ‘give me the number. I’ll call. What did you want to know? Go on, shoot.’
‘Only if you’re sure, Fi.’
‘Of course I’m not sure. I got the sack because of him. Did he take up with me simply because I was on the case and nosing things out? Or did he … But I’m a big girl now: if I messed up then I need to put things right now.’ Her voice cracked. All these years later.
‘Let me deal with him,’ Fran urged. ‘I’ll give him your number, but I’ll ask the questions.’
‘But that way I might never hear his voice again.’
‘So it’s a matter of sitting here and waiting for things to happen,’ Fran said, huddling up against the Aga.
‘Not for long. While you were out there, I took a call too. In that little corridor, before you ask. Just in case. The IPCC guy, Dan Wilson. I shall know if he isn’t who he says he is: I was on a course with him at Hendon.’
‘All the same … dear God, I hope he’s kosher. What if he’s bent too?’
‘His front tooth should be – unless he’s had it straightened. That looks like him now.’ An unmarked car sidled up to the Audi, as if unsure of its welcome.
‘We can’t talk here! But what if he … abducts us?’
He grabbed her shoulders. ‘A week ago, would you even have had such a fear, let alone voiced it? How many bent cops have you ever known? Yes, it’s Dan. See that tooth? What’s up? Your face is a study.’
‘The guy that’s with him. The Asian guy. He seems to be waving at me.’
‘Wave back, then. OK, let’s talk to them outside.’
‘They call me Elephant Man, ma’am – I mean Fran. Nothing to do with my ugly mug either.’ Unconsciously he smiled with the knowledge that some might even call him handsome. ‘Because I never forget. I can’t help it. Once I’ve seen a face I know it. The Met even call me in sometimes to look at a crowd scene and see if I can pick out the face of a criminal they want. There’s quite a team of us.’
‘Super recognition. Like having perfect pitch,’ Dan explained.
Mark scratched his head. ‘Let me get this straight: you two had the briefest of conversations in Birmingham – what – six or eight years ago, and you still recognized her?’
‘Of course,’ Naz said. ‘Fran’s easy to recall – her height, of course, her demeanour, and a very memorable face, too, sir.’
Fran grimaced. ‘You wouldn’t expect me to remember a name, would you? But I dimly remember the occasion. Naz was in uniform then,’ she said, with increasing certainty. ‘It was the time I made the old chief eat a speciality Birmingham curry. And you, of course. But you’ve moved on, Naz? A DCI.’ Progress indeed.
‘Only acting, to be honest.’
‘Even so.’
By now the four of them were dithering with cold.
‘DCS Wilson recruited me when he heard about my visual memory. And here we are, ready to listen to anything you have to tell us. But maybe,’ he added, ‘we do it somewhere warmer and drier. Dan’s car, maybe. We can talk as we go to pick up those bugs.’
‘We shall need our own wheels,’ Fran pointed out. ‘Mark, why don’t you and Dan catch up while I tail you? If he doesn’t mind, Naz can fill me in with news of some of my old friends in Birmingham. Provided I can remember their names,’ she added, not entirely joking.
‘Young Si, arrested!’ Fran squeaked, staring in disbelief at the chic receptionist who’d dispensed coffee and sympathy the previous day. ‘You’re joking. Call the manager, please.’ She had no legal authority; she shouldn’t be the person doing this. She stepped back smartly to let Naz and Dan flash their IDs and talk the talk. Naz, anyway. Dan was snarling into his phone. Mark morphed back into senior officer mode with a single footstep forward.
The manager, sleek as his cars, addressed himself exclusively to the men, even the preoccupied Dan. A year ago, Fran wouldn’t have let him get away with such sexist behaviour. But now she confined herself to staring at the fully dressed teddy bear in his glass cage, which bizarrely became the personification of the helpful young man. She’d thought there was a pattern: the injury to Edwina apart – and even that was amateurish – the attempts to deter them had been irritations, harming property rather than people. Even the Hindlip Hall thefts were on the scale of things trivial, things meriting only a local CID investigation, not really the full might of the rubber heel brigade. But arresting a man they knew to be entirely innocent could ruin his career. That was going altogether too far.
Mark came over, putting his arm round her. ‘It seems that young Si changed the safe code without telling anyone, because he was so concerned when he saw the police car turn up without any warning from us. So the manager is frothing at the mouth – no one can access any of the keys and his business is at a standstill. As you can see. Or not.’ He spread an arm to indicate the hordes who, if they’d been present, might have been tearing impotently at car doors. ‘My mate Dan is arranging for Si to be brought back. Fortunately he wasn’t arrested, just invited to help with enquiries. So he won’t have a stain on his escutcheon, whatever one of those might be. He’ll open the safe; Dan and Naz will get their evidence. We could go home.’
Arms akimbo, Fran stared. ‘Why could, not can?’
‘Because I want us to go in person to apologize to the Garbutt parents for losing their treasures.’
‘You might say that but you mean something else, don’t you? Even if I’m not quite sure what.’ Fran looked him in the eye. ‘Mark, they didn’t take to me any more than I took to them. This is a gig you’d be better doing without me. Truly.’ Her phone rang. ‘Fi Biddlestone: I’d better take this.’ She retreated behind a scarlet Quattro.
‘He’ll talk to you. Somewhere neutral, he suggests. There’s a service area on the M5, near Junction Three. The east side, in the ordinary coffee area. Eleven. You know his number if the time doesn’t work.’
‘Fi, are you all right?’
Her swallow was audible. ‘You don’t know what I’d give to come with you. But barring a helicopter, I shall have to sit this one out. And perhaps it’s for the best.’ She ended the call before Fran could say any more – assuming, of course, that she could have thought of anything.
She wandered back to Mark. ‘Do you have any particular time in mind to talk to the Garbutts? Because we have a slight logistics problem. One car; two different directions.’ She explained.
He ran his fingers over his hair, as if checking it was still there. Most of it was, at least. ‘How would you feel about getting Dan to request the return of our team? Just until all the loose ends have been tied up? They’d be useful for ferrying us around if nothing else.’
She took his hand. ‘My heart says yes. But my head’s trying to shake all by itself. Just in case. In case …’
He raised hers to his lips. ‘That’s what I hoped you’d say. This is the first time I’ve ever had even the tiniest doubt about people I want to trust implicitly. I know you’ve not been quite so lucky.’
‘No. But I wasn’t totally impotent then. And I could conjure a driver from thin air when I needed one,’ she added with mock bitterness.
‘You could conjure me,’ Dan said, materializing by her shoulder. ‘I could commandeer the car bringing this man Si back here, couldn’t I?’
‘Much as I love the idea of the poor driver being made to walk back, no, you couldn’t and no, Fran couldn’t,’ Mark said quickly. ‘Because I’ve got to grovel to these good people and the more senior the officer beside me the better. In any case, I suspect the guy Fran’s going to meet will run a mile at the sight of a proper officer.’
‘In that case,’ Naz said with a saturnine grin, ‘I’ll do the commandeering: the sooner one of us starts talking to people at Hindlip the better. And if you’re busy, gaffer, it had better be me. But I might just let the poor guy drive me, not walk.’
TWENTY-FOUR
‘Dear God,’ Desmond Markwell declared, looking around him in disgusted despair at Frankley Services, ‘this has to be one of the worst places in the country.’
Fran couldn’t argue. ‘Your choice,’ she retorted. ‘As was the coffee. We could have spoken over the phone, you know.’
‘I may have every anti-bugging device going, but I still prefer not to take risks. And I take it you’re not wired?’
‘If I was, it’d be hard for anyone to hear any conversation above that lot.’ She jerked her head. A loud and numerous family had arrived at the next table. ‘Over there? Your turn. You choose the table.’
The one he picked was still covered with detritus. She watched him move it all to another table, dusting his fingers in surprisingly finicky movements to clear probably non-existent crumbs.
‘The sooner you get everything off your chest, the sooner we’ll be out of here,’ she pointed out, as he sat down at last, but now played with his disposable stirrer.
‘Very well. Here goes. Phil Foreman paid me a great deal of money to discover why the police were making no progress in their search for his son. Bother his wife, or words to that effect. No, just where his son was. And he gave me enough money to bribe the chief constable if necessary. You’re supposed to ask me if I tried,’ he said, conscious charm in every millimetre of his smile and his crows’ feet. Poor Fi.
On the other hand Fran was inclined to resent being used as an opportunity to hone his flirtation skills. ‘Whom did you attempt to suborn – not necessarily with cash?’
‘If you’re thinking I was simply using Fi, forget it. She was the love of my life, that woman.’ He turned eyes lustrous with tears towards her. ‘My wife—’
‘Is an invalid, I gather.’
His eyebrows made an appreciative leap. ‘Has been since before I met Fi. And even I am not sufficiently beyond the pale to think of leaving her. Not – not yet. But Fi – you’ve no idea how much I’ve wanted to hear Fi’s voice. Wanted to hear it for twenty years.’
Fran was beginning to feel queasy. ‘As if you couldn’t have run her to earth like that by looking in the phone directory.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘Any other attempts, with or without money?’
‘The locals closed ranks. Many of the police were locals. QED.’
‘You said that Phil was only interested in finding his son. His marriage was as flaky as everyone believes? How did he feel about her helping herself to his money?’
‘He was more than re
ady to do a deal: you keep all the cash, so long as I get Hadrian. But there really was no sign of her. Or Hadrian. In the end, he paid me in full, again in cash, because without Natalie that was how he did things, and had a huge bonfire. I was there. I saw.’
‘Why on earth should you be?’
‘He didn’t have a lot of friends, Fran. And he saw me as having some spurious legal status as a witness. Anyway, everything that had been hers went on it.’
Fran’s mental thumbs began to twitch. ‘Including?’
‘Clothes. A lot of good clothes. I babbled about charity shops, and such, but on the pyre they had to go. Shoes, ditto. Books, ditto.’
‘So she was expunged from his life. What about Hadrian’s stuff? He surely never burned that?’ Irritatingly her voice changed.
He noticed. ‘You see, you are capable of sentimentality. He isn’t a perceptive man, Phil, but even he registered the shock in my face. In the end, I washed all Hadrian’s things, soft toys and clothes, and sealed them in one of those storage bags you pump the air out of. Some of Julius’s too. He put it in a storage unit when he moved south. I’ve got a key and authorization to remove it, should Hadrian ever show up. Only if he ever shows up.’
Fran nodded; she wouldn’t try to force the issue on that point. ‘You’re assuming he hasn’t taken it to Northern Cyprus?’
‘I could check. But I really doubt it. He’s had other relationships since, and that sort of thing might not go down well with new partners, might it? Interestingly he’s never had any other children – I am a PI, you know!’ he added with that wretched winning smile. ‘Do you think it might be connected with Julius’s condition? That he’s the carrier?’
‘You’re the PI,’ she retorted, grinning despite herself. ‘But it’s hardly germane to our enquiry, is it? But that bonfire might be, you know. Was there anything that didn’t go on it? You’ve told me a lot that did. Was there anything that struck you at the time – or since – as a notable omission?’ She smiled. ‘Confession is supposed to be good for the soul.’
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